News tagged with liposomes

The creation of membranes is of enormous importance in biology, but also in many chemical applications developed by humans. These membranes are shaped spontaneously when soap-like molecules in water join together. Researchers ...

Sanguinarine is a natural product, a chemical made by certain plants including the bloodroot plant (Sanguinaria canadensis), the Mexican prickly poppy (Argemone mexicana), Chelidonium majus, and Macleaya cordata. It is a ...

Some anti-cancer drugs are encapsulated to allow gradual release, spreading their effect over a longer time. For example, one formulation of the chemotherapy doxorubicin (the FDA-approved drug Doxil) encloses molecules of ...

A research group of Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Keio University and Tohoku University have successfully developed an artificial cytoskeletal structure for cell models (liposomes ...

Synthetic biology allows scientists to design genetic circuits that can be placed in cells, giving them new functions such as producing drugs or other useful molecules. However, as these circuits become more complex, the ...

Synthetic biology involves creating artificial replica that mimic the building blocks of living systems. It aims at recreating biological phenomena in the laboratory following a bottom-up approach. Today scientists routinely ...

Many cosmetic companies praise liposomes for their alleged ability to transport juvinating and nourishing agents deep into the skin, but also drug researchers have high hopes for liposomes: If they can carry nourishing agents ...

By blowing extremely small bubbles, researchers from the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience at Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) have found an efficient way of producing so-called liposomes – very small bubble-like ...

Usually the microbe S. islandicus is found in hot and acidic volcanic springs, but now the microbe has also found its way to the labs of University of Southern Denmark. Here researchers have for the first time showed that ...

Liposome

Liposomes are artificially prepared vesicles made of lipid bilayer. Liposomes can be filled with drugs, and used to deliver drugs for cancer and other diseases. Liposomes are composite structures made of phospholipids and may contain small amounts of other molecules. Though liposomes can vary in size from low micrometer range to tens of micrometers, unilamellar liposomes, as pictured here, are typically in the lower size range with various targeting ligands attached to their surface allowing for their surface-attachment and accumulation in pathological areas for treatment of disease. Liposomes can be prepared by disrupting biological membranes, for example by sonication.

Liposomes can be composed of naturally derived phospholipids with mixed lipid chains (like egg phosphatidylethanolamine) or other surfactants. Liposomes should not be confused with micelles and reverse micelles composed of monolayers.